September 2019 #13

[Stroan]

Oops, we filled up the last thread. Hope everyone finds this one.

@Puglover88 they are now happy, been there weekly so it feels a bit bizarre!
@DustyDoorframes MW already refused because she didnt want to risk touching the cord, which got a very brief but noticeable eye raise of Mr consultant. Fair enough I'd rather she was happy, but might be calling hospital by Monday begging to get try.

Crikey I might be getting a bigger baby than I thought, I can see why scans are all over the place having had so many(and having a bit of experience on some similar measurement kit with solid parts never mind a moving baby with soft skin), but the last own shit me up!

Hi @SJP3
The facebook group set a cut off of 1 Sept for new joiners as babies were coming and people were sharing very personal info about their births and photos, so they didn’t feel comfortable having newbies join later I’m afraid (as obviously facebook not anonymous like on here). Hence they did a final call a little while ago for any mumsnet people to join in. But the postnatal thread on here will hopefully be active too (I’m doing both).

Feeling slightly more relaxed now, the poorly cat has finally decided he can eat! His temperature has also rallied too. Thank the F for that, I was trying to work out how we’d juggle us both in different hospitals!!
Now if all my fur babies could just fecking behave for the next couple of days so my poor frazzled soul can concentrate on this baby business that’d be marvellous.

Off to have a quiet sob into the mane of the equine shortly, going to be away from her for a while which I’ll hate. Today is going really fast!!

Thanks Megan I'm just a bit late to the party. Will keep up on here and the post natal one.

Sorry it's not getting any easier with the animals... I think you're doing an amazing job at all this juggling!

Took my 85 year old grandma out for a cream tea today and she was telling about what they used to do to induce women: she was given a large glass of cod liver oil topped with orange juice to down and then given an enema! 😬 they did this daily until labour started! Thank god times have changed!

@Puglover88 Jesus yeah thank god haha!

Blimey! I can't imagine it was terribly effective either!

To the people who have babies: does your baby look like they are straining to do a poo?
Arthur seems to cry and what looks like strainining. It's always followed by him farting and pooping and as soon as it's done he is completely fine. On googling I've read conflicting things. One saying it's normal and they aren't actually in pain and the other saying could be a sign of colic. I see for colic it manifests around 2 to 4 weeks with the incessant crying but so far, and fingers crossed, he doesn't do that.

I haven’t noticed Jacob crying to poo but he definitely seems to be straining. I read it was normal and they’re just learning how to poo basically and they’re mainly on their backs with no gravity to help

@April88 thanks. I think the crying just comes with the strain, it's not bad but the straining does concern me. I hold him facing outwards holding his thighs so it's like he's sitting on a seat and that does seem to help. Just hate seeing him look uncomfy.

My other problem is he will not sleep in his next 2 me cot. I have him sleeping on or beside me every night which I didn't want to do and actually is sometimes really awkward for me because I can't roll over etc. I don't know how I'll get him to sleep in it! Eek

@horehound blimey that must be hard. If co-sleeping is working for you then just carry on and maybe try him in it occasionally, to see if he changes his mind?

I’m quite lucky mine sleeps in his but it’s probably because he was used to sleeping alone whilst in NICU. He does sleep on me a lot in the day though!

@Horehound we had trouble cracking the next to me too. Swaddling helped as did a dummy for the first couple of days. He's not interested in the dummy now either thankfully but it did seem to help break him in. And I just always put him down really sleepy and milk drunk so he's half asleep anyway. Have you tried white noise?

He will may be sleep in his Moses basket for an hour or so in the day but yeh the rest of the time he's on me.
He seems to like lying on his side and really any time I put him on his back, he sicks up a bit.
Ooof I'm tired today.

@kyles101 have tried white noise and it works for about 5 mins!! I have considered a dummy tbh although did want to avoid dummies. I have noticed him rooting about only for him to just hold my nipple in his mouth not feeding. If I take it out he thrashed about as if I've taken his whole world from him!

We're the same here @Horehound DD will not sleep in her bedside crib at night, only on me or next to me. We've even put the sleepyhead in it which she naps fine in during the day, but no, not happy at night. I really didn't want to co-sleep but it's the only way we can get any sleep at all. It's draining as I don't sleep deeply when she's next to me. And DH has moved to the spare room which we both hate. Ugh.

She also wants to feed for comfort all the darn night -- I know it's not just cluster feeding, because she only feeds for about 2 minutes and then falls asleep. Then wakes up and wants to latch on again. I'm tempted to try her with a dummy, although again I wanted to resist that as DD1 had one and it's been a bugger to get her to stop using it. But getting so so tired!

DD1 has always been a brilliant sleeper and we never had any issues with her going to sleep in the bedside crib. So this is most definitely karma for being smug first time round!

Also tried white noise and putting my top in the crib and it's done F all other than the white noise putting me to sleep

@BridgetJonesDaiquiri sounds like we are in exactly the same situation. I feel your pain.

I have expressed tonight because he fed from both sides and still seemed to be rooting around when my husband was holding him. I've pumped 150ml and have separated it all into 50ml feeds. I went to tidy the kitchen and make a cuppy, came back through and dh saying he was furious saying he hates the bottle. Gosh it's so hard to know what to do. He did take bottle ok with me and my mum earlier in the week. The health visitor told us to keep him with a bottle every so often so we can leave him every so often with grandparents etc. Man I hope he sleeps tonight!

@BridgetJonesDaiquiri i lolled at the white noise comment. I too found myself nodding off listening to it whilst baby was still kicking about and last night I tried my t shirt in with him...nope.

@Horehound which bottles are you using? We have the medela calma ones which are weird looking but are supposed to mimic the effort that babies have to put into breastfeeding. We also used Mam ones with DD1 which were pretty good. Just try him with a bottle every now and again, it's all you can do really and great if your DH does some of the night feeds (mine doesn't but then he has to deal with toddler DDs 5am starts these days plus work, so I let him off!)

You're a trooper with all that pumping. I should really do it more than I have been doing but just CBA to feed all day and pump during the brief downtime I get when she finally naps!

Best of luck with sleep tonight. Sending sleepy vibes to our babies....

@BridgetJonesDaiquiri ywp medala with calma test. I bought loads of bottles and 4 extra tests when we were struggling to bf but now I really only use 1 bottle and 1 test. What a waste of money. But maybe I'll use them if I want to reduce actual bf.

We've given him a bottle and he's still been crying and fussing. Immediately stopped when tried on boob. He's not sucking really so deffo just on for comfort. Oh he's so cute though but this whole bringing up a baby is hard!

@Horehound And @BridgetJonesDaiquiri ha - we all have the same baby!! Also a side layer - he manages to get himself on his side, it's all of his top half and kind of his leggies so I'm not overly worried, he's so strong. And yes, will root then just nap with nipple in mouth. It's pretty adorable but not great for sleeping - hence dummy. I'd try it, then just never give it in the day like us, even for day naps. We need sleep! we use mam bottle and dummy

@Megan2018 good luck today! Fingers crossed they have a bed for you! 🤞 xx

Good luck for today @Megan2018

Good luck megan! Hope it is as stress free as possible!

Lol @kyles101 yes Arthur is a side sleeper too!! In fact at some point last night he went to sleep on his side facing me and when we woke up he was on his side in other direction...yikes. He's also really strong..can hold his head up independently for a good few minutes. Omg
I had a haaka dummy which I was going to use last night but I double checked the age and it's for 3m+. So I'll buy some online today. He did go in his cot for ohhh 1 hour max last night. I tried the hot water bottle on mattress first so think that helped.